Daily Archives: June 22, 2018

An incredible amount of energy goes into producing our Sunday services. Looking at last Sunday’s run sheets this was the number of people who directly served at each service:

8am – 24 people

10am – 36 people

KIC – 32 people

6pm – 31 people

Add to this the hours that staff and volunteers have put into preparation including sermon preparation, band practices, video production, notice sheet production, stage set and lighting preparation, cleaning, etc. the total number of hours is significant! (a quick mental calculation puts the number into the hundreds of hours preparation for the four services at our church each Sunday). Each separate part of each service is carefully thought through. The entire service from beginning to end also needs to be cohesive. Our church services are important, and we all put in the hours as a reflection of how important they are to us.

Why?

Because we want to glorify God in the best possible way we can. In doing this we want to have an orderly worship service that is engaging and edifying.

The Corinthian church was struggling with this. It might have been a case of too many cooks in the kitchen. Paul is going to lengths to help them think carefully through how they do church. He starts with centering them on Jesus! Second he corrects their motivation – its all about loving each other when they gather (Follow the way of love – 14:1; Everything must be done so that the church may be built up – 14:26). The problem was that they had placed themselves at the center and what they wanted in a service.

This self centred attitude flowed over into their attitude towards speaking in tongues. (Anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies themselves – 14:4). Pauls solution? prophecy (14:4b). This isn’t to be understood as BIG ‘P’ Prophecy – like an OT prophet who heard a voice from God, but rather the prophecy or declaration of scripture expounded and applied to the life of the church. Anyone who reads the bible aloud in a gathering is prophesying because they are speaking God’s words after him.

Orderly and edifying worship is so important that if ever anyone accuses our church of doing something contrary to this, we must listen very carefully. We wont get it right all the time, but collectively we should hold each other accountable.